One of the perks of running this website is that I get to know all these great people and make new friends. One of them is Dan Davies, an 18 year old goalkeeper and goalkeeper trainer at Castle Vale.  Dan was greatly influenced and mentored by Alex Penny from the Bristol City Academy. Dan and I exchanged quite a few emails and he asked me what he could do to help his 16 year old goalkeeper to improve his footwork, especially across the goal before a shot is taken. Well Dan, I have come up with the following training activities for your goalkeeper:

I would start working with the goalkeepers in a controlled environment, and assuming there is at least one back-up keeper I have set this up for 2 keepers. Create a grid of about 6 x 6 yards with 4 coaching sticks or cones and line up 10 yards or so away and have the keepers start at the far corner, as illustrated in picture 1.

 

Have the goalies start at 50% of their speed, shuffling to just outside the next cone and get in a set position (email me on the correct set position if you would like to learn more) for a second or 2 and then have them move forward to the next corner and get set for a second or two and then shuffle to the next corner and get set for 2 seconds and then backpedaling to the corner where he started and get set which is also the cue for goalkeeper number 2 to start the same sequence. Have them repeat this 5-10 times depending on age and ability. So now with 4 cones we have created forward movement, backward movement and sideway shuffling to both sides. So watch for correct footwork on the different movements and make sure that the keepers keep their hands in front. We would progress to having them do this at 75% and after 5-10 reps have them go at game speed.

Picture 1

Now as they get somewhat tired you will have to watch closely for any breakdowns in their technique. As they shuffle, make sure their feet (heels) don’t touch; there should be no sound other than them starting to breath heavy :) The goalkeepers need to move well balanced on the balls of their feet focused on the (imaginary) ball. As soon as you are confident that the goalkeepers are performing their footwork correctly then move onto the next phase where we will ask the goalies to go around the cones again, but this time tell them not to stop at the corners. Now the coach will have a ball at his feet, instructing the goalkeepers to carefully watch the ball and now the keepers have to get into a set position every time the coach lifts his leg, pretending to shoot. The coach can do this at any given moment which adds a whole new dimension to this activity where the goalkeepers have to really focus on the ball and the ‘striker’, just as they would in the game. Make sure the keepers do not “round” the corners but make nice, sharp cuts.

Next we would give the coach (server) a couple of balls and have one keeper start on the outside of the grid and the other behind the grid (picture2).

Goalkeeper 1 will shuffle into the center of the grid, get set and make a save off the serve of the coach. He will then exit through the open side (the left in picture 2) and immediately goalkeeper number 2 will come forward to the center of the grid, get set, make a save and exit through the open side (now being the right side, picture 3).

Then goalkeeper number one will enter the grid, get set, make a save and exit through the open side (now the back) and so on. Simply instruct your keepers to exit through the open side other than the front. You can do this for a good 20 minutes or so, making sure to keep mixing up the serves. The above activities are perfect to work on the goalkeepers’ footwork for the shorter distances, especially across the goal. Should the keeper have to cover more ground than 5 yards or so then I recommend the cross-over run or even a regular run after a partial cross over step which are faster.

After the above activities we can now get into a goalkeeper training activity where we make the goalie cover more ground. We need 3 field players, positioned as in picture 4. Ball starts with player 1 and the goalkeeper positions himself accordingly. Player 1 will pass the ball to player 2 and then onto player 3, back to player 2 and then back to player one. The keeper will have to move in relation to the ball continuously.

Do this for as long you deem necessary and then have the field players pass to each other in no particular order. This changes a lot for the keeper especially where at first he might have been able to get away with shuffling to adjust his position; now the keeper will have to use the cross-over or regular run (after the partial cross-over step) to adjust his position when player 1 passes to player 3 or vice versa. The last phase in this activity is to have the field players take a shot at goal every once in a while, in no particular order.

Dan my friend I hope this helps you, please let me know how these activities worked for your goalies ok? As always, all of our readers/members are invited to email me with their comments/questions or suggestions at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , even if they are totally unrelated to this topic. I look forward to hearing from you all!